


Oh what she'd give to hear that laugh

by LilibethSonar



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Fluff, That's Not How The Force Works, reylovalentines2019
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-14
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-10-28 04:35:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17780660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LilibethSonar/pseuds/LilibethSonar
Summary: Carefully setting the projector on her open palm, Rey says, “Well, these aren’t just baby holos. They’re yours. You know, those from the rusty projector your mother has?”Ben blanches.___Of how Ben Solo returned to the light to prevent his mom from embarrassing him further.





	Oh what she'd give to hear that laugh

**Author's Note:**

> I claimed this lovely prompt for this exchange:  
> "In Universe - Leia shows Rey pictures/holos of Ben when he was a child. Later, when Rey is looking at the images (again) and laughing and crying about Ben, a Force Connection opens between Rey & Kylo."  
> Unfortunately, I had to cut it short, but I hope you (whoever you are) will like this story anyway. (It's also brutally unbetaed for now, sorry!)

"Sit with me," General Organa,  _ Leia  _ says, patting the cushion next to her. "There's something I want to show you."

Gingerly, Rey perches on the edge of the too low settee, knees sticking up at an awkward angle. The Resistance's host is a Bravaisian - a wealthy merchant on the surface; a rebel at heart - so for humans and anyone human-sized every piece of furniture here feels doll-like. Well, maybe for anyone, except Leia. The woman commands the space around her, seeming as at home on the remote villa on Bravais as she did in the  _ Falcon's _ captain's quarters, her regal gown as blue as the starry night peeking through heavy curtains.

Leia places an old holoprojector on the caf table in front of them. The device's model is well familiar to Rey which means it's extremely dated. It's rather miniature, composed of several hololenses on the round base. The power button is wonky. Sadness settles in the lines of Leia's mouth as she struggles with the button. Sadness that makes Rey think of Ben.

She thinks of him... all the time. Trying to fit into tiny chairs, trying to fix the lightsaber, trying  _ not to think _ about him. But near his mother, it's especially bad. Rey bats the mental image of him away, trapping a sigh behind her lips, and turns her full attention to Leia. 

What are the chances, though, that Rey is right to think about Ben? 

The projector whirls to life, and Rey looks, confused, at a still holo of a baby, desaturated by the room's soft light, a blueish shimmer around its edges. The holo morphs into another one and another as Leia turns the small wheel at the projector's side. Some are still, others capture movement, a few distorted seconds at a time, closed into jerky loops. The baby grows into toddler, and Rey recognizes.... 

His hair. The way he pouts. Moles - Ben had way less back then, but the most noticeable are already dotting his face.  _ Ben. _

The recognition is painful.

Rey aches to look her fill, yet she averts her gaze, suddenly feeling like an intruder  _ and  _ an imposter. She shouldn't know his features by heart. She has no place in this story.

Leia senses her turmoil.

"Don't be shy," she says, covering Rey's hand with her own. "You trusted me with what had transpired between you and Ben on the  _ Supremacy _ . With his... choice. I'm trusting you with these. Rey, I need you to keep them safe while I'm away. I wouldn't normally leave the holos behind, but...."

Rey looks up at the older woman, surprised. (It's funny how she always seems to be looking up at Leia, even though Rey is so much taller than her.) She's known, of course, that Leia is going off-world in search of allies, new and lost, but it wouldn't be the first time, and she's never requested members of the Resistance to guard her belongings before.

"Do you think this place is unsafe?" Rey asks in a low voice, brows drawn.

"No." Leia switches the projector off, and the room becomes that much emptier and quieter, bereft of the soundlessly laughing child. Ben is older on the last holo Rey sees, already very recognizable even for a side viewer. "It's more about where I'm going and who I'm meeting with. People are picky these days, harder to win over the longer we remain in hiding, so I can't risk something so compromising being found among my possessions should anybody become nosy. Away from Bravais  _ or _ here."

"Okay." Rey nods, hoping to appear confident, but the movement betrays her nervousness nevertheless, head bobbing awkwardly. The projector is pulling her attention in like a black hole.

Leia, too, can't take her eyes away from the thing.

"That's quite a bargain I offer," she chuckles dryly. Rey isn't sure if the older woman is still talking to her or to the boy from the holos. "A secret for a secret, but yours is a spiritual connection and mine is... a piece of junk full of baby pictures."

Leia's hand is still covering Rey's, her touch warm. On an impulse, Rey places her free hand on top of their joined ones. "It's not junk," she says with the sense of urgency, needing to reassure the older woman of…. Rey doesn't know of what, but Leia's eyes shine in answer.

"Thank you." Between Rey's calloused palms, Leia's hand is very small. "It's all I have left of him, after all."

 

*

 

Days pass, and Rey keeps thinking back to the words Leia told her as she placed the projector in Rey’s hands and closed her fingers around it.

“I know it’s not the easiest thing to hold on to, for you, but if that brings you any comfort, there are holos in here that would make him so, so embarrassed.” The older woman added it as an afterthought, a wry smile tugging at the corners of her bitter mouth.

Rey doesn’t want to look at the holos again; the projector is tucked safely away in her old boot, the beaten up pair from the Jakku times collecting dust under her bed. She doesn’t look.

It’s too late. Rey has already lost Ben to the dark. Seeing him as a child, still innocent, and light, and without a care in the world, will do nothing but make her mourn the future that will never come even more. So Rey doesn’t look at the holos.

Until she does.

It’s a mix of confusion and curiosity that makes her cave in. Because… how could one’s childhood holos be embarrassing? Her lacking any holos of her as a child - lacking childhood - is the reason for Rey’s lack of understanding, but understanding  _ this  _ doesn’t really help. Guesses she comes up with on her own make no sense (that is, when they aren’t downright creepy), and Rey can’t ask anyone without raising answering questions. The projector isn’t her truth to reveal, and she’s already told her friends too many lies.    

The access to the HoloNet being strictly limited due to security measures, Rey has no other way to ease her mind but to dig that blasted projector from under her bed. She hits her head in process because the bed frame is too low - of course - and emerges from under it red in the face and defeated. Then she sits cross-legged on her magically fine embroidered blanket, puts the projector in front of her, and switches it on, at last.

 

*

 

Rey doesn’t make it very far into the timeline populated by chubby tiny Bens. She’s no less perplexed: the toddler before her seems genuinely happy on every holo, and those depicting him running around stark naked show just how well he’s being fed and cared for, so what’s there to be ashamed of? But she’s also amused.

Yes, before the pain rooted in her heart sprouts new thorns, Rey allows tender amusement to bloom under her ribs. She finds herself smiling widely for the first time in weeks, noticing it only because her cheeks are starting to hurt, she’s so enthralled by the past. The holos emit no sound because the projector is too old; Rey makes no sound either, her breathing soon becoming labored.

But, oh, at the sight of little Ben’s translucent butt, she giggles, and the Force carries the watery sound across the universe. The bond hums in response and opens before Rey gathers the will to stop it from happening.

Ben doesn’t spare her a glance, but the Force is calm around him, unlike the few other times their bond has brought them together since Crait. He’s not purposefully subjecting her to his silence, then; Ben’s half-asleep. Rey isn’t even sure he’s aware of her presence, that being a nice reprieve from the tension she has come to expect.

Timidly, Rey lifts her eyes and nearly chokes. The real, now-Ben is slouching in a chair, his face sallow and eyelids heavy, and from where Rey’s sitting on her low bed, it looks like he has the nakey-nakey toddler-Ben perched on his knee. Her first impulse upon the bond’s opening was to switch the projector off, yet Rey’s hand freezes a hair away from the power button. Something is compelling her to keep watching, so she does, afraid to blink.

The blue-haloed toddler in Ben’s lap… blows a bubble from his own spit, and as it pops, laughs so hard he falls on his side and starts bawling with tears - then the holo loops. And the unsuspecting Supreme Leader is snuffling peacefully all the while.

The scene is surreal, yet so… domestic. An odd longing stirs in the pit of Rey’s stomach, and another, nervous giggle makes it past her tightly pressed lips.

It startles Ben awake.

Wide-eyed, Ben’s staring at her - he hasn’t done so, hasn’t looked directly at her in so, so long - and Rey feels  _ caught _ . She grabs the projector to switch it off and hide it and then herself. In her sudden panic, she’s too late to realize that if Ben couldn’t see the projector while she wasn’t touching it, he most certainly can see it now - shifting to it, his eyes become comically round. Naturally, the power button choses this exact moment to jam itself, leaving Rey as wide-eyed as Ben.

She’s clasping the holoprojector in sweaty hands.

The buck naked holo of Ben’s two year old self is laughing and crying between the two of them.

Ben blinks, and shakes his head, and rubs his face with his bare palms. “Now, that’s an odd one,” he says on a sigh.

“Odd what?” Heart beating wildly, Rey keeps the projector between them like a shield.

“Odd dream. Among all of the stupidly lustful scenarios I see you in, cooing at baby holos seems out of place.”

Rey licks her lips. This accidental confession is not what she expected to hear, but she senses how the Force is coiling around it, around  _ them _ , how it tingles on her tongue. This conversation is important.

Carefully setting the projector on her open palm, Rey says, “Well, these aren’t  _ just  _ baby holos. They’re yours. You know, those from the rusty projector your mother has?”

Ben blanches.

Rey flicks to the next holo and…. Little Ben wasn’t a big fan of closes, was he? The blue-haloed toddler runs in circles, his cheeks and butt cheeks equally round. 

The real Ben pounces at her with a hissed curse, reaching for the projector, but it falls on the bed with the slight turn of Rey’s wrist, and instead of the device Ben grabs her hand.

There’s a second of absolute stillness as it dawns on him that he’s not dreaming. Once again they are touching skin to skin through the Force, and Rey is holding her breath as the new, beautiful, beautiful future fills her lungs and spills from the corners of her eyes. She was wrong; Rey didn’t lose Ben Solo to the dark because she wasn’t meant to win him from it.  _ He  _ has to do it. 

“Rey,” she hears. Ben is repeating her name over and over, voice wavering and eyes closed.

“Your baby holos,” she rasps, bringing him out of his trance. He looks like he’s forgotten all about them, so Rey repeats, “The holos. I’ve got a projector full of them and I haven’t seen even the half yet. If you want to stop me… come home.”


End file.
